May 8, 1945 - Victory in Europe Day

Gordon Nicol's copy of the ships orders aboard the S.S. Ranchi
for May 8th, Source: Linda Rosenbaum

With Germany's unconditional surrender the day before, May 8, 1945 marked Victory in Europe Day.  Tom Ditson was on his way back to Canada to continue recovering from the injuries he acquired during the Pforzheim raid.

Douglas Hicks marked the end of the war in Europe among his fellow ‘Guinea Pigs’ at the Canadian Wing of the Queen Victoria Hospital in East Grinstead, where anyone mobile made their way into town.  Patients acquired kegs of beer, took them back to the ward and tied them to the portable bed tables.  With their make-shift beer wagon in tow they made the rounds to the beds of the immobile patients.

Following his liberation from Dulag Luft, Gordon Nicol would return to Canada, celebrating the occasion with his fellow passengers returning to Canada from England aboard the S.S. Ranchi.

Gerard Kelleher and David Yemen would not only celebrate the end of the war in Europe, but their return to England after the liberation of Stalag Luft VIIA.  Kelleher and Yemen would leave Stalag Luft VIIA returning to England on or about May 8th via nearby Landshut airfield, where several thousand former Allied POWs were being shuttled to airfields at Rheims, France and Brussels, Belgium for the onward journey to England by air.

One-time crew members Albert Colin and William Towle would have marked the end of the war in the company of fellow airmen at 550 Squadron, where from April 29th to May 7th, they participated in Operation Manna, air dropping food to the starving population of the Netherlands.

Sadly for the families of Robert Harris, Eric Robinson and Kenneth Smith, there would be no homecoming.

Listen to Canada's Prime Minister address the nation on May 8, 1945